Running With The Demon Page 4

  Old Bob shook his head. Well, the Fourth of July was almost here, and the Fourth, with its fireworks and picnics and the dance in the park, might help take people's minds off their problems.

  A few minutes later he pulled into a vacant parking space in front of Josie's and climbed out of the cab. The sun's brightness was so intense and the heat's swelter so thick that for a moment he felt light-headed. He gripped the parking mirror to steady himself, feeling old and foolish, trying desperately to pretend that nothing was wrong as he studied his feet. When he had regained his balance sufficiently to stand on his own, he walked to the parking meter, fed a few coins into the slot, moved to the front door of the coffee shop, and stepped inside.

  Cold air washed over him, a welcome relief. Josie's occupied the corner of Second Avenue

  and Third Street

  across from the liquor store, the bank parking lot, and Hays Insurance. Windows running the length of both front walls gave a clear view of the intersection and those trudging to and from their air-conditioned offices and cars. Booths lined the windows, red leather fifties-era banquettes reupholstered and restitched. An L-shaped counter wrapped with stools was situated farther in, and a scattering of tables occupied the available floor space between. There were fresh-baked doughnuts, sweet rolls, and breads displayed in a glass case at the far end of the counter, and coffee, espresso, hot chocolate, tea, and soft drinks to wash those down. Josie's boasted black cows, green rivers, sarsaparillas, and the thickest shakes for miles. Breakfast was served anytime, and you could get lunch until three, when the kitchen closed. Takeout was available and frequently used. Josie's had the best daytime food in town, and almost everyone drifted in to sample it at least once or twice a week. Old Bob and his union pals were there every day. Before the mill was shut down, only those who had retired carne in on a regular basis, but now all of them showed up every morning without fail. Most were already there as Old Bob made his way to the back of the room and the clutch of tables those who had gotten there first had shoved together to accommodate latecomers. Old Bob waved, then detoured toward the service counter. Carol Blier intercepted him, asked how he was doing, and told him to stop by the office sometime for a chat. Old Bob nodded and moved on, feeling Carol's eyes following him, measuring his step. Carol sold life insurance.

  "Well, there you are," Josie greeted from behind the counter, giving him her warmest smile. "Your buddies have been wondering if you were coming in."

  Old Bob smiled back. "Have they now?"

  "Sure. They can't spit and walk at the same time without you to show them how-you know that." Josie cocked one eyebrow playfully. "I swear you get better-looking every time I see you."

  Old Bob laughed. Josie Jackson was somewhere in her thirties, a divorcee with a teenage daughter and a worthless ex-husband last seen heading south about half a dozen years ago. She was younger-looking than her years, certainly younger-acting, with big dark eyes and a ready smile, long blondish hair and a head-turning body, and most important of all a willingness to work that would put most people to shame. She had purchased Josie's with money loaned to her by her parents, who owned a carpet-and-tile business. Having worked much of her adult life as a waitress, Josie Jackson knew what she was doing, and in no time her business was the favorite breakfast and lunch spot in Hopewell. Josie ran it with charm and efficiency and a live-and-let-live attitude that made everyone feel welcome.

  "How's Evelyn?" she asked him, leaning her elbows on the counter as she fixed him with her dark eyes.

  He shrugged. "Same as always. Rock of ages."

  "Yeah, she'll outlive us all, won't she?" Josie brushed at her tousled hair. "Well, go on back. You want your usual?"

  Old Bob nodded, and Josie moved away. If he'd been younger and unattached, Old Bob would have given serious consideration to hooking up with Josie Jackson. But then that was the way all the old codgers felt, and most of the young bucks, too. That was Josie's gift.

  He eased through the clustered tables, stopping for a brief word here and there, working his way back to where the union crowd was gathered. They glanced up as he approached, one after the other, giving him perfunctory nods or calling out words of greeting. Al Garcia, Mel Riorden, Deny Howe, Richie Stoudt, Penny Williamson, Mike Michaelson, Junior Elway, and one or two more. They made room for him at one end of the table, and he scooted a chair over and took a seat, sinking comfortably into place.

  "So this guy, he works in a post office somewhere over in Iowa, right?" Mel Riorden was saying. He was a big, overweight crane operator with spiky red hair and a tendency to blink rapidly while he was speaking. He was doing so now. Like one of those ads showing how easy it is to open and close a set of blinds. Blink, blink, blink. "He comes to work in a dress. No, this is the God's honest truth. It was right there in the paper. He comes to work in a dress."

  "What color of dress?" Richie Stoudt interrupted, looking genuinely puzzled, not an unusual expression for Richie.

  Riorden looked at him. "What the hell difference does that make? It's a dress, on a man who works in a post office, Richie! Think about it! Anyway, he comes to work, this guy, and his supervisor sees the dress and tells him he can't work like that, he has to go home and change. So he does. And he comes back wearing a different dress, a fur coat, and a gorilla mask. The supervisor tells him to go home again, but this time he won't leave. So they call the police and haul him away. Charge him with disturbing the peace or something. But this is the best part. Afterward, the supervisor tells a reporter-this is true, now, I swear-tells the reporter, with a straight face, that they are considering psychiatric evaluation for the guy. Considering!"

  "You know, I read about a guy who took his monkey to the emergency room a few weeks back." Albert Garcia picked up the conversation. He was a small, solid man with thinning dark hair and close-set features, a relative newcomer to the group, having come up from Houston with his family to work at MidCon less than ten years ago. Before the strike, he set the rolls in the fourteen-inch. "The monkey was his pet, and it got sick or something. So he hauls it down to the emergency room. This was in Arkansas, I think. Tells the nurse it's his baby. Can you imagine? His baby!"

  "Did it look anything like him?" Mel Riorden laughed.

  "This isn't the same guy, is it?" Penny Williamson asked suddenly. He was a bulky, heavy-featured black man with skin that shone almost as blue as oiled steel. He was a foreman in the number-three plant, steady and reliable. He shifted his heavy frame slightly and winked knowingly at Old Bob. "You know, the postal-worker guy again?"

  Al Garcia looked perplexed. "I don't think so. Do you think it could be?"

  "So what happened?" Riorden asked as he bit into a fresh Danish. His eyes blinked like a camera shutter. He rearranged' the sizable mound of sweet rolls he had piled on a plate in front of him, already choosing his next victim.

  "Nothing." Al Garcia shrugged. "They fixed up the monkey and sent him home."

  "That's it? That's the whole story?" Riorden shook his head.

  Al Garcia shrugged again. "I just thought it was bizarre, that's all."

  "I think you're bizarre." Riorden looked away dismissively. "Hey, Bob, what news from the east end this fine morning?"

  Old Bob accepted with a nod the coffee and sweet roll Josie scooted in front of him. "Nothing you don't already know. It's hot at that end of town, too. Any news from the mill?"

  "Same old, same old. The strike goes on. Life goes on. Everybody keeps on keeping on."

  "I been getting some yard work out at Joe Preston's," Richie Stoudt offered, but everyone ignored him, because if brains were dynamite he didn't have enough to blow his nose.

  "I'll give you some news," Junior Elway said suddenly. "There's some boys planning to cross the picket line if they can get their jobs back. It was just a few at first, but I think there's more of them now."

  Old Bob considered him wordlessly for a moment. Junior was not the most reliable of sources. "That so, Junior? I don't think the company will a
llow it, after all that's happened."

  "They'll allow it, all right," Deny Howe cut in. He was a tall, angular man with close-cropped hair and an intense, suspicious stare that made people wonder. He'd been a bit strange as a boy, and two tours in Vietnam hadn't unproved things. Since Nam, he'd lost a wife, been arrested any number of times for drinking and driving, and spotted up his mill record until it looked like someone had sneezed into an inkwell. Old Bob couldn't understand why they hadn't fired him. He was erratic and error-prone, and those who knew him best thought he wasn't rowing with all his oars in the water. Junior Elway was the only friend he had, which was a dubious distinction. He was allowed to hang out with this group only because he was Mel Riorden's sister's boy.

  "What do you mean?" Al Garcia asked quickly.

  "I mean, they'll allow it because they're going to start up the fourteen-inch again over the weekend and have it up and running by Tuesday. Right after the Fourth. I got it from a friend on the inside." Howe's temple pulsed and his lips tightened. "They want to break the union, and this is their best chance. Get the company running again without us."

  "Been tried already." Al Garcia sniffed.

  "So now it's gonna get tried again. Think about it, Al. What have they got to lose?"

  "No one from the union is going back to help them do it," Penrod Williamson declared, glowering at Howe. "That's foolish talk."

  "You don't think there's enough men out there with wives and children to feed that this ain't become more important to them than the strike?" Howe snapped. He brushed at his close-cropped hair. "You ain't paying attention then, Penny. The bean counters have taken over, and guys like us, we're history! You think the national's going to bail us out of this? Hell! The company's going to break the union and we're sitting here letting them do it!"

  "Well, it's not like there's a lot else we can do, Deny," Mel Riorden pointed out, easing his considerable weight back in his metal frame chair. "We've struck and picketed and that's all the law allows us. And the national's doing what it can. We just have to be patient. Sooner or later this thing will get settled."

  "How's that gonna happen, Mel?" Howe pressed, flushed with anger. "Just how the hell's that gonna happen? You see any negotiating going on? I sure as hell don't! Striking and picketing is fine, but it ain't getting us anywhere. These people running the show, they ain't from here. They don't give a rat's ass what happens to us. If you think they do, well you're a damn fool!"

  "He's got a point," Junior Elway agreed, leaning forward over his coffee, nodding solemnly, lank blond hair falling into his face. Old Bob pursed his lips. Junior always thought Deny Howe had a point.

  "Damn right!" Howe was rolling now, his taut features shoved forward, dominating the table. "You think we're going to win this thing by sitting around bullshitting each other? Well, we ain't! And there ain't no one else gonna help us either. We have to do this ourselves, and we have to do it quick. We have to make them hurt more than we're hurting. We have to pick their pocket the way they're picking ours!"

  "What're you talking about?" Penny Williamson growled. He had less use for Derry Howe than any of them; he'd once had Howe booted off his shift.

  Howe glared at him. "You think about it, Mr. Penrod Williamson. You were in the Nam, too. Hurt them worse than they hurt you, that was how you survived. That's how you get anywhere in a war."

  "We ain't in a war here," Penny Williamson observed, his finger pointed at Howe. "And the Nam's got nothing to do with this. What're you saying, man? That we ought to go down to the mill and blow up a few of the enemy? You want to shoot someone while you're at it?"

  Derry Howe's fist crashed down on the table. "If that's what it takes, hell yes!"

  There was sudden silence. A few heads turned. Howe was shaking with anger as he leaned back in his chair, refusing to look away. Al Garcia wiped at his spilled coffee with his napkin and shook his head. Mel Riorden checked his watch.

  Penny Williamson folded his arms across his broad chest, regarding Derry Howe the way he might have regarded that postal worker in his dress, fur coat, and gorilla mask. "You better watch out who you say that to."

  "Derry's just upset," said a man sitting next to him. Old Bob hadn't noticed the fellow before. He had blue eyes that were so pale they seemed washed of color. "His job's on the line, and the company doesn't even know he's alive. You can understand how he feels. No need for us to be angry with each other. We're all friends here."

  "Yeah, Derry don't mean nothing," Junior Elway agreed.

  "What do you think we ought to do?" Mike Michaelson asked Robert Roosevelt Freemark suddenly, trying to turn the conversation another way.

  Old Bob was still looking at the man next to Howe, trying to place him. The bland, smooth features were as familiar to him as his own, but for some reason he couldn't think of his name. It was right on the tip of his tongue, but he couldn't get a handle on it. Nor could he remember exactly what it was the fellow did. He was a mill man, all right. Too young to be retired, so he must be one of the strikers. But where did he know him from? The others seemed to know him, so why couldn't he place him?

  His gaze shifted to Michaelson, a tall, gaunt, even-tempered millwright who had retired about the same time Old Bob had. Old Bob had known Mike all his life, and he recognized at once that Mike was trying to give Derry Howe a chance to cool down.

  "Well, I think we need a stronger presence from the national office," he said. "Derry's right about that much." He folded his big hands on the table before him and looked down at them. "I think we need some of the government people to do more-maybe a senator or two to intervene so we can get things back on track with the negotiations."

  "More talk!" Deny Howe barely hid a sneer.

  "Talk is the best way to go," Old Bob advised, giving him a look.

  "Yeah? Well, it ain't like it was in your time, Bob Freemark. We ain't got local owners anymore, people with a stake in the community, people with families that live here like the rest of us. We got a bunch of New York bloodsuckers draining all the money out of Hopewell, and they don't care about us." Derry Howe slouched in his chair, eyes downcast. "We got to do something if we expect to survive this. We can't just sit around hoping for someone to help us. It ain't going to happen."

  "There was a fellow out East somewhere, one of the major cities, Philadelphia, I think," said the man sitting next to him, his strange pale eyes quizzical, his mouth quirked slightly, as if his words amused him. "His wife died, leaving him with a five-year-old daughter who was mildly retarded. He kept her in a closet off the living room for almost three years before someone discovered what he was doing and called the police. When they questioned the man, he said he was just trying to protect the girl from a hostile world." The man cocked his head slightly. "When they asked the girl why she hadn't tried to escape, she said she was afraid to run, that all she could do was wait for someone to help her."

  "Well, they ain't shutting me up in no closet!" Derry Howe snapped angrily. "I can help myself just fine!"

  "Sometimes," the man said, looking at no one in particular, his voice low and compelling, "the locks get turned before you even realize that the door's been closed."

  "I think Bob's right," Mike Michaelson said. "I think we have to give the negotiation process a fair chance. These things take time."

  "Time that costs us money and gives them a better chance to break us!" Derry Howe shoved back his chair and came to his feet. "I'm outta here. I got better things to do than sit around here all day. I'm sick of talking and doing nothing. Maybe you don't care if the company takes away your job, but I ain't having none of it!"

  He stalked away, weaving angrily through the crowded tables, and slammed the door behind him. At the counter, Josie Jackson grimaced. A moment later, Junior Elway left as well. The men still seated at the table shifted uncomfortably in their chairs.

  "I swear, if that boy wasn't my sister's son, I wouldn't waste another moment on him," Melvin Riorden muttered.

  "He's
right about one thing," Old Bob sighed. "Things aren't the way they used to be. The world's changed from when we were his age, and a lot of it's gotten pretty ugly. People don't want to work things out anymore like they used to."

  "People just want a pound of flesh," A! Garcia agreed. His blocky head pivoted on his bull neck. "It's all about money and getting your foot on the other guy's neck. That's why the company and the union can't settle anything. Makes you wonder if the government hasn't put something in the water after all."

  "You see where that man went into a grocery store out on Long Island somewhere and walked up and down the aisles stabbing people?" asked Penny Williamson. "Had two carving knives with him, one in each hand. He never said a word, just walked in and began stabbing people. He stabbed ten of them before someone stopped him. Killed two. The police say he was angry and depressed. Well, hell, who ain't?"

  "The world's full of angry, depressed people," said Mike Michaelson, rearranging his coffee cup and silver, staring down at his sun-browned, wrinkled hands fixedly. "Look what people are doing to each other. Parents beating and torturing their children. Young boys and girls killing each other. Teachers and priests taking advantage of their position to do awful things. Serial killers wandering the countryside. Churches and schools being vandalized and burned. It's a travesty."

  "Some of those people you talk about live right here in Hopewell." Penny Williamson grunted. "That Topp kid who killed his common-law wife with a butcher knife and cut her up in pieces a few years back? I grew up with that kid. Old man Peters killed ail those horses two weeks back, said they were the spawn of Satan. Tilda Mason, tried to kill herself three rimes over the past six months-twice in the mental hospital. Tried to kill a couple of the people working there as well. That fellow Riley Crisp, the one they call 'rabbit' lives down on Wallace? He stood out on the First Avenue Bridge and shot at people until the police came, then shot at them, and then jumped off the bridge and drowned himself. When was that? Last month?" He shook his head. "Where's it all going to end I wonder?"